Used Astra

Jigsaw

Hi folks, I have been looking at some Astras recently and have more or less decided that I am gonna go for a 2003 SXi model. I was at a dealership yesterday and I was shown an Astra 2.0 DTI SXi model. I've never driven a diesel before and, rightly or wrongly, always thought that although there were more fuel economical they were also more sluggish. The salesman was telling me about how powerful it was compared to other Astras and that this model in particular was more desirable than the petrol equivalents. I'd be grateful if someone could give me a bit of advice here because I don't know a massive amount about cars and don't want to get done over by some wide boy salesman.

Cheers

furtzy

Modern turbo diesels such as the one you're looking at are definintely not sluggish. They offer far superior torque and power than their petrol equivalents. The 2.0DTi has been replaced by the CDTi range and is no longer in production and has 100bhp.

Diesels are more desirable second hand especially if they are low mileage.

What is your annual mileage going to be?

Jigsaw

Thanks for that furtzy. I guess I'd be doing a pretty low mileage as I walk to work every day (5 min walk ). So I suppose maybe between 6000 and 7000 mile a year would be a ballpark figure. The actual mileage on the car is 41k. I took it for a test drive last night and it felt like a nice drive.

furtzy

Thats pretty low mileage. Diesels give better fuel economy but are more expensive to buy. The economic savings only kick in if you're doing higher mileage thus saving on fuel costs. Saying that I just much prefer the ease of driving of diesel and the better torque.

But as I always say if you like it buy it

colm_mcm

I don't reckon a 2.0 diesel astra is too desirable. sure, it's nicer to drive than a 1.4 but I don't reckon it's worth more. 1.7 or 1.3 diesel maybe.

kluivert

If you are only going to be doing small mileage like that, I would go for the 1.4l Astra. I have a 1999 with 103k miles on the clock and its still going very strong IMO.

I have done 55k miles in the last three years since I bought it and even at that I dont think its worth buying the deisel.

The 2.0 DTi SXI is the Astra of choice for that model. You can get the car re-mapped to 130bhp which will make the car so much nicer to drive.

I was looking for one of them myself when i bought this one, where did you see it, but the petrol model does the job for now.

Make sure there is a full service history with it.

Jigsaw

kluivert wrote:

If you are only going to be doing small mileage like that, I would go for the 1.4l Astra. I have a 1999 with 103k miles on the clock and its still going very strong IMO.

I have done 55k miles in the last three years since I bought it and even at that I dont think its worth buying the deisel.

The 2.0 DTi SXI is the Astra of choice for that model. You can get the car re-mapped to 130bhp which will make the car so much nicer to drive.

I was looking for one of them myself when i bought this one, where did you see it, but the petrol model does the job for now.

Make sure there is a full service history with it.

I saw it in Ballyrobert Vauxhall just north of Belfast. I'm going to check it out again just now because when I saw it on Tuesday it had just arrived in and hadn't been spruced up yet. I think the salesman might have mentioned that it had something like 130bhp. Can't wait to see it today though!! As soon as they put it up on their website (if I haven't bought it by then) I will post a link.